raged in their error* more by the accidental advantages we have given them by our weak arguings than by any truth of their cause, or excellency of their wit. But the use I make of it as to our present question is this: that since there is no direct impiety in the opinion, nor any that is apparently consequent to it, and they with so much probability do, or may, pretend to true persuasion, they are, with all means Christian, fair, and humane, to be redargued or instructed; but if they cannot be persuaded, they must be left to God, who knows every degree of every man's understanding, all his weaknesses and strengths, what impress each argument makes upon his spirit, and how irresistible every reason is; and he alone judges his innocency and sincerity. And for that question, I think there is so much to be pretended against that which I believe to be the truth, that there is much more truth than evidence on our side; and therefore we may be confident as for our own particulars, but not too forward peremptorily to prescribe to others, much less to damn, or to kill, or to persecute them that only in this particular disagree.

* Οὐκ ἐν τοῖς ἐαυτῶν δόγμασι τεν ίσχυν έχοντες, ἀλλ ̓ ἐν τοῖς ἡμετέρων σαθροῖς ταύτην θηρύοντες, as Nazianzen observes of the case of the church in his time.

349

That there

SECTION XIX.

may

be no Toleration of Doctrines inconconsistent with Piety or the public good.

BUT then for their capital opinion, with all its branches, that it is not lawful for princes to put malefactors to death, nor to take up defensive arms, nor to minister an oath, nor to contend in judgment, it is not to be disputed with such liberty as the former. For although it be part of that doctrine which Clemens Alexandrinus says was delivered by private tradition from the apostles, 'that it is not allowable for Christians to go to law, neither before the heathen nor believers; and that a righteous man ought not to take an oath ;'* and the other part seems to be warranted by the eleventh canon of the Nicene council, which enjoins penance to them that take arms after their conversion to Christianity; yet either these authorities are to be slighted, or be made receptive of any interpretation, rather than the commonwealth be disarmed of its necessary supports, and all laws made ineffectual and impertinent: for the interest of the republic and the well-being of bodies politic is not to depend upon the nicety of our imaginations, or the fancies of any peevish or mistaken priests; and there is no reason a prince should ask John-aBrunck whether his understanding will give him

"Non licere Christianis contendere in judicio, nec coràm gentibus, nec coràm sanctis, et perfectum non debere jurare."-Lib. vii. Stromat.

leave to reign, and be a king. Nay, suppose there were divers places of Scripture which did seemingly restrain the political use of the sword, yet since the avoiding a personal inconvenience hath by all men been accounted sufficient reason to expound Scripture to any sense rather than the literal, which infers an unreasonable inconvenience, (and therefore the pulling out an eye and the cutting off an hand is expounded by mortifying a vice, and killing a criminal habit,) much rather must the allegations against the power of the sword endure any sense, rather than it should be thought that Christianity should destroy that which is the only instrument of justice, the restraint of vice and support of bodies politic. It is certain that Christ and his apostles, and Christian religion, did comply with the most absolute government, and the most imperial that was then in the world; and it could not have been at all endured in the world if it had not; for, indeed, the world itself could not last in regular and orderly communities of men, but be a perpetual confusion, if princes and the supreme power in bodies politic were not armed with a coercive power to punish malefactors. The public necessity and universal experience of all the world convinces those men of being most unreasonable that make such pretences, which destroy all laws and all communities, and the bands of civil societies, and leave it arbitrary to every vain or vicious person, whether men shall be safe, or laws be established, or a murderer hanged, or princes rule. So that, in this case, men are not so much to dispute with particular arguments as to consider the interest and concernment of kingdoms and public societies; for the religion of Jesus Christ i

the best establisher of the felicity of private persons and of public communities; it is a religion that is prudent and innocent, humane, and reasonable, and brought infinite advantages to mankind, but no inconvenience, nothing that is unnatural, or unsociable, or unjust. And if it be certain that this world cannot be governed without laws, and laws without a compulsory signify nothing, then it is certain that it is no good religion that teaches doctrine whose consequents will destroy all government; and therefore it is as much to be rooted out as any thing that is the greatest pest and nuisance to the public interest. And that we may guess at the purposes of the men and the inconvenience of such doctrine, these men that did first intend by their doctrine to disarm all princes and bodies politic, did themselves take up arms to establish their wild and impious fancy; and, indeed, that prince or commonwealth that should be persuaded by them, would be exposed to all the insolences of foreigners, and all mutinies of the teachers themselves; and the governors of the people could not do that duty they owe to their people of protecting them from the rapine and malice which will be in the world as long as the world is. And therefore here they are to be restrained from preaching such doctrine, if they mean to preserve their government; and the necessity of the thing will justify the lawfulness of the thing. If they think it to themselves, that it cannot be helped so long as it is innocent, as much as concerns the public; but if they preach it they may be accounted authors of all the consequent inconveniences, and punished accordingly. No doctrine that destroys government is to be endured; for although those doctrines

are not always good that serve the private ends of princes or the secret designs of state, which, by reason of some accidents or imperfections of men, may be promoted by that which is false and pretending; yet no doctrine can be good that does not comply with the formality of government itself, and the well-being of bodies politic: Cato, when an augur, ventured to say that the omens were always in favour of what was for the public good, and against whatever was the reverse.'* Religion is to meliorate the condition of a people, not to do it disadvantage; and therefore those doctrines that inconvenience the public are no parts of good religion. The safety of the state is a necessary consideration in the permission of prophesyings; for according to the true, solid, and prudent ends of the republic, so is the doctrine to be permitted or restrained, and the men that preach it, according as they are good subjects and right commonwealth's men; for religion is a thing superinduced to temporal government, and the church is an addition of a capacity to a commonwealth, and therefore is in no sense to disserve the necessity and just interests of that to which it is superadded for its advantage and conservation.

And thus, by a proportion to the rules of these instances, all their other doctrines are to have their judgment, as concerning toleration or restraint ; for all are either speculative or practical; they are consistent with the public ends or inconsistent, they teach impiety or they are innocent, and they are to be permitted or rejected accordingly. For in

"Augur cum esset Cato, dicere ausus est, optimis auspiciis ea geri quæ pro reipublicæ salute gererentur; quæ contra rempublicam fierent, contra auspicia fieri.”—Cicero de Senectute.